R help - Aug 2003 - Does order() behave differently on different platforms?

Hello, 

I am running R 1.7.1 on two platforms and it seems to me that order() behaves 
differently on them. I noticed this when a test case passed in linux but 
failed on solaris. This is the behavior on the solaris platform: 

R.Version()
$platform
[1] "sparc-sun-solaris2.8"

$arch

[1] "sparc"
$os
[1] "solaris2.8"

$system
[1] "sparc, solaris2.8"

$status
[1] ""

$major
[1] "1"

$minor
[1] "7.1"

$year
[1] "2003"

$month
[1] "06"

$day
[1] "16"

$language
[1] "R"
> x <- c("a", "b", "c", "(d")
> sort(x)
[1] "(d" "a"  "b"  "c" 

This is the behavior on the linux platform: 
> R.Version()
$platform
[1] "i686-pc-linux-gnu"

$arch
[1] "i686"

$os
[1] "linux-gnu"

$system
[1] "i686, linux-gnu"

$status
[1] ""

$major
[1] "1"

$minor
[1] "7.1"

$year
[1] "2003"

$month
[1] "06"

$day
[1] "16"

$language
[1] "R"

 x <- c("a", "b", "c",
"(d")
> sort(x)
[1] "a"  "b"  "c"  "(d"

Am I missing something here or is there really a difference in the way order() 
works on different platforms? Thanks for your help. 

Regards, 
Raja

Raja Surapanani wrote:
> Hello, 
> 
> I am running R 1.7.1 on two platforms and it seems to me that order()
behaves
> differently on them. I noticed this when a test case passed in linux but 
> failed on solaris. This is the behavior on the solaris platform: 
> 
> R.Version()
> $platform
> [1] "sparc-sun-solaris2.8"
[SNIP]
>>x <- c("a", "b", "c", "(d")
>>sort(x)
> 
> [1] "(d" "a"  "b"  "c" 
> 
> This is the behavior on the linux platform: 
> 
> 
>>R.Version()
> 
> $platform
> [1] "i686-pc-linux-gnu"
[SNIP]
>>sort(x)
> 
> [1] "a"  "b"  "c"  "(d"
> 
> Am I missing something here or is there really a difference in the way
order()
> works on different platforms? Thanks for your help. 
You missed to read the help page. ?sort tells us:

"The sort order for character vectors will depend on the collating 
sequence of the locale in use: see Comparison."

Please follow that reference and read ?Comparison as well.

Uwe Ligges

Following Uwe's and Dirk's suggestions, here's a first pass at a
list of
interesting "general" help pages:

?Arithmetic
?Comparison
?Control
?DateTimeClasses
?Defunct
?Deprecated
?Devices
?Extract
?Foreign
?Logic
?Memory
?Paren
?Rdconv      (RdUtils page: Rdconv, Rd2dvi, Rd2txt, Sd2Rd)
?Special     (beta, gamma, choose, ...)
?Startup
?Syntax
?build       (PkgUtils page: R CMD build, R cmd check)
?connections (file, pipe, ...)
?pi          (Constants page: LETTERS, letters, month.abb, month.name, pi)

Note that the RdUtils, PkgUtils, and Constants pages cannot be accessed through
their names ("?RdUtils", etc).

I'd also suggest two additional general pages (which do not currently
exist):
?System   (system, .Platform, Sys.info, Sys.getenv, Sys.putenv, getwd, setwd)
?Graphics (covering plot, lines, points, segments, par, Devices)
-- 
                              -- David Brahm (brahm at alum.mit.edu)